Extremes of Experience

My
heart is a ghost town, with owls, ravens and jackals. Once beauty,
now only serpentine. Its magnificent now in its place ophidian.
Silhouettes of vampire ghosts. It is burning, but still covered in
frost. A hounded heart, a ghost town. It all goes back to the
November of 2019. Three months heavy and happy. When I first told him
that I was expecting his child, he was overwhelmed and excited. Asked
me to keep it, and together we built castles in the air of how we
would raise our child. He promised me heaven. How would a string of
words make a person ache for a place she did not know? But in that
moment, I could not help it but see a happy future of my baby walking
hand in hand with its parents.

The
first two months of the first trimester was peaceful. He provided all
that I needed and did not. He loved me. Or so I thought. Then came
the third month and something in him snapped. He started loving me
fiercely, violently, and madly. He loved me in punches and bruises.
In his own painful way, he loved me and I convinced myself that this
was the only way he knew. He loved me and I bore the scars to prove
it. Beauty is pain but love? Love is torture and I was loved until I
was not. Until the very scars that I had worn with pride revolted him
and he sent me away packing.

Toyed
and lied to. Hanging on a thread; a shattered heart and a broken
soul, he killed me. Just like that, in broad daylight. He was in the
army, I was a student. My parents did not know that I was expectant.
I never had the courage of letting them know because of how ashamed
and disappointed they would be at me. There was no way I was going to
raise a child without a father and no finance. And thus had to make a
dreadful choice. Loaned money from my friends to be able to afford
the hospital bill. A big black sky was over me as I lay in the
hospital bed that evening awaiting my fate.

The
start of dusk, the beginning of misery. I was given the first shot,
to trigger labor pains. The first rose on my rose tree; budded,
bloomed and shattered. By midnight, the sac had ruptured and out came
the amniotic fluid, and then what would have been my baby. Two things
died that night, my love for life and my love for humanity. It seemed
like nothing until the hurricane hit.

Who
knew that with pregnancy loss came along depression? Memories were
tragedy because of my brain. The things that clouded my thoughts were
worse than what is in the abyss. Nights came that I could not hold
back and were on the cold floor seeking out true freedom from within
for my soul to be as light as feathers. I was slowly falling into a
pit hole yet no one noticed. I wanted to be mad at everyone for not
seeing my pain, or rather for seeing and choosing to ignore. I became
a visitor in my own mind. I was like a rose in the desert; afraid I
would burn in the scorching sun and get blown away.

It
was a call that I received from a nurse who checked on me at the
hospital that got me on my feet. Apparently, some officials from the
Kenya Medical Research Institute (KEMRI) were doing a research study
on reproductive health. The research study was on finding and
understanding how best to deliver services to young women that could
protect them from contracting HIV and other sexually transmitted
infections. The study was sponsored by the University of Washington
in the USA, and the Children’s Investment Fund Foundation in
the United Kingdom, in partnership with the Kenya Medical Research
Institute (KEMRI) in Kenya. The name of the research study was
Evaluation of Pre-exposure prophylaxis Delivery Integrated with
Reproductive Health Services for Kenyan Adolescent Girls and Young
Women,( The PrEDIRA Study).

The
research study included young men, peers, mothers, fathers and
reproductive health providers from the community. Group discussions
were held where views and ideas were shared of how helpful
Pre-exposure prophylaxis ( PrEP ) would be to young women to prevent
HIV. The purpose of the study was to understand whether it was a good
idea to offer Pre-exposure prophylaxis as part of the services that
are available to women after pregnancy loss, and combine the
Pre-exposure prophylaxis delivery with an offer for contraception.
True to the idea, almost half of young women who get pregnant and
experience pregnancy loss are likely to be pregnant again within one
year. Women receiving post-pregnancy services would want to know
about how to prevent HIV at the same time.

At
first, I would sit through the discussions mum. Afraid, ashamed and
hurting. Trying so hard to hide my pain. Sometimes people hide
because they do not know how to express themselves. Sometimes people
hide because they have scars. In my case, I hid my pain because it
was the only language that I spoke fluently. But as I sat and
listened to girls narrate their experiences, I started warming up to
them and saw it as more of a help group. I soon found my voice, for
my memories had taken it away. Slowly, the safe space created there
helped me climb out of the pit that I had fallen into. Every day, I
would make a choice to put one foot in front of the other. Until
finally I overcame.

Now
back at school, strong and empowered, I decided it was time to make
change. Most schools, primary and secondary, and institutions of
higher learning do not offer any talks on reproductive health and sex
education to their students. Would it not be better for a girl or boy
in school to know the end results of involving oneself with the
other? With support from a few friends , we decided to equip
ourselves with all the information on reproductive health and sex
education. We researched and visited health centers to ask questions
and arm ourselves with information. Two weeks later, we started
holding forums on whatsapp groups and university halls to our fellow
students. Later, we extended our hand to neighboring primary and
secondary schools that approved of us. The open forums that we held
opened the eyes of many since most of the youth do not get to have
such talks from their parents, guardian or teachers.

It
is easier and freer for a group of peers sharing and exchanging ideas
on reproductive health rather than having adults talk to the youth.
Therefore equipping a group of youth volunteers with all the needed
necessary knowledge on reproductive health and sending them to
schools and institutions to empower their peers is more effective.
The idea of the government just issuing out free condoms does not
entirely help avoid early pregnancies or sexually transmitted
diseases. This is because most people do not have the courage to walk
into hospitals and get them.

Introducing
reproductive health and sex education talks in the syllabus as a
bonus non-examinable subject helps spread the gospel faster like bush
fire. Let them be educated on their bodies as spiritual organs, and
why the body keeps score and conscious relationships. A wide range of
the youth would be empowered. Some would argue that this idea would
only push the younger generation into engaging in the act, but are
they not already curious? Is it not better going to war armed rather
than armed? If they learnt that with sex comes along early unplanned
for pregnancies and sexually transmitted infections such as syphilis
among others, would they then not choose to abstain?

In
addition to that, creating toll free lines for guidance and
counseling would also be of positive impact. The lines would be
operated on by friendly and understanding qualified reproductive
health officers. This way, one would have his or her doubts confirmed
and questions answered. Rather than blindly following the masses, the
youth would be able to ask for guidance on issues touching on
reproductive health. Parents who feel uncomfortable talking to their
children on this topic would be unburdened.

Introducing
programs that apart from offering sex education also gives students
from humble backgrounds the opportunity to practice income generating
activities. Statistics show that most students who end up pregnant
are those from poor homes. These students are easily lured into
having unprotected sex by bodaboda operators and matatu conductors.
This is in the case of a student in a day primary or secondary school
who has to trek for kilometers in order to get to school and cannot
afford fare every day. A bodaboda operator tricks her into a habit of
free rides to school in exchange of sex. A desperate student will
walk into this situation with or without knowing the end result.
However, having a program during the weekends and school holidays
where these students come together harness their talents in weaving
,beading, basketry among others and then earn some money will at
least not make them fall prey to these traps. During this period, the
students have a session with reproductive health officers who talk to
them on the dangers of transactional sex for the few who engage in
sex for free rides to school. You will find an operator luring and
engaging in unprotected sex with more than one girl thus increasing
the chances of spreading sexually transmitted diseases. It becomes a
cycle. It should therefore be wiser for them to know what they are
getting into and abstain and treat their bodies as spiritual organs.

In
summary, most of the youth especially young women and adolescent
girls are at a high risk of contracting sexually transmitted diseases
out of mere ignorance and thus the ideas mentioned above help create
awareness to them. It is in my opinion that once these ideas are
implemented, there would be a reduced number of cases of early
unplanned for pregnancies among students and lower the risks of
contracting sexually transmitted infections and, or sexually
transmitted diseases.

I am Joyberyl Abwao. I'm a 22 year old who lives in Kenya and
currently a student at the university. I'm a poet and a freelance
writer.